Friday, November 30, 2012

Today at the UMNO general assembly, Negeri Sembilan delegate Jalaludin Alias was very point-blank when he mocked BN component parties Gerakan and MCA by declaring that only UMNO can protect the Chinese community. Jalaludin said this when debating the party president Najib Razak's policy speech. What I am hearing is that UMNO has to do the job because the two parties have abdicated from their responsibilities.

Therefore, if Malaysians accept what he says, then we can dump, drop and discard Gerakan and MCA. I agree with Jalaludin – so we cannot depend on the parties to look after the Chinese. (See, who says I am always giving UMNO the black eye?) Given this reality, the non-Malays should not even consider to vote for the two useless parties! Gerakan and MCA will be goners come GE13.

On Wednesday evening, I was in SS19 in Subang Jaya for the Subang Toastmasters meeting – I received the invitation when I met Melvin Cheah at the Klang Bilingual Toastmasters meeting last Monday. I was both the General Evaluator as well as an Evaluator for an Advanced speech from the Interpretive Reading manual. A smallish crowd but the members were eager and enthusiastic. I would give this meeting a score of a 6 out of a 10.

Celtic reminded everyone why they are SPL champions with a comprehensive 4-0 win over Hearts on Wednesday night. The former forced their way in front in the 10th minute when Kris Commons' cross from the left found Lassad Nouioui who confidently volleyed it low past Hearts goalie Jamie MacDonald at his near post. Then in the twenty-second minute, right-back Mikael Lustig, with assist from Nouioui, stabbed the ball past MacDonald for Celtic’s second goal. The third goal came when Charlie Mulgrew's cut-back was deflected into his own net by Hearts midfielder Ryan Stevenson (30). And finally Gary Hooper volleyed in a Mulgrew cross (83) to reward Celtic with the fourth goal.

Malaysians cannot help but know that the UMNO General Assembly is on, i.e. November 27-December 01, 2012. The mainstream press is devoting pages and pages of the proceedings but one headline in yesterday’s Star stood out like a sore thumb – ‘Shahrizat: Trust UMNO’ (p 10). Of all people, Shahrizat Abdul Jalil should not be the one who speaks about trust because she betrayed the government and even her party when her family brought about the NFC scandal that centered on cows and luxury condos amongst other extravagances. So if she is not to be trusted, why should people trust UMNO just because she said so? Except for her mindless minions in Wanita UMNO, nobody in their right mind would listen to her babbling prattle.

On Wednesday afternoon, I was at KPMG Tower in PJ’s Bandar Utama to evaluate Grace Loh’s advanced speech at their Toastmasters meeting. I have always enjoyed their meetings and this was no different. I was glad I came. My score for this meeting is a 7 out of a 10.

The EPL game between Liverpool and Tolttenham Hotspur also on Wednesday was another forgettable episode. Yup, the Reds lost 1-2. Poor defending led them down and Spurs took advantage when Gareth Bale's low cross from the left allowed Aaron Lennon to open the scoring in the seventh minute with a tap-in. Then Bale added a second when his 25-yard free-kick left Reds goalkeeper Pepe Reina virtually motionless on the line (16). Liverpool pulled one back during a fortunate circumstance when the unlucky Bale headed into his own net (72). The picture below expresses my sentiment with regard to Brendan Rodgers!

Thursday, November 29, 2012

Chinese internet users are rallying around a Beijing blogger detained by police after posting a joke on Twitter about the paramount Communist Party congress.

Zhai Xiaobing's tweet on November 05 suggested that the next "movie" in the "Final Destination" horror franchise would be about the Great Hall of the People (pictured above) collapsing on party delegates.

He had tweeted: "An earthshaking debut will be seen at the global premiere on Nov 8!" The congress began on November 08, 2012.

Family members had said that Miyun county police had taken Zhai away on November 07 and seized his computer. A Miyun county police officer who would only give his surname, Sun, confirmed that Zhai was being investigated for "spreading terrorist information". The charge carries a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.

Groan! The allegation is certainly silly, if not absurd. Obviously, China authorities have absolutely no sense of humor at all.

Note: For those of you who are not familiar with this horror movie franchise, Final Destination – please note that there are no fanged monsters, killer beasts, vengeful spirits or even the stereotypical slashers. It is about the Grim Reaper who manipulates the environment in deadly ways with the single-minded intent of "recapturing" those who somehow manage (usually through warning premonitions) to escape their fates the first time. Death is inescapable in the Final Destination universe. Check out the stills from the said movies below:

Also on Tuesday, SUBS students had their MKT2074 Marketing Research presentations and Jessica Ho and I banded together with their lecturer, Derek Ong to judge their works. One of the groups' client, Timo represented by Irrine Goh from BioFact Life Sdn Bhd, was also present.

Former inspector-general of police Musa Hassan (above photo) has confirmed what Malaysians knew all along.

Yesterday, at a press conference in Petaling Jaya called by Malaysian Crime Watch Task Force (MyWatch), with which Musa serves as patron – he said that the police force under him faced interference from Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein.We were told that Hishammuddin had even given instructions directly to junior police officers and a district police chief without his knowledge.Musa explained: “So, I highlighted to him (Hishammuddin) Section 4 (1) of the Police Act (1967, which says) that the command and control of the police is by the IGP and not the minister".He added: “Of course, I cannot be rude to him as (he is) a minister. I talked to him nicely. He didn’t like it”.Other politicians and “top people” have also tried to interfere in the arrest of certain criminals, Musa had also asserted.And with a straight face, this vile varmint claimed he wasn’t at all influenced, that he didn’t buckle under, that he was honourable all the way – which of course, is a lot of gibberish. He is trying to portray himself to be a principled professional but we know better! He stinks to high heaven because as the IGP, he had been generously serving us bucketfuls of horseshit. That’s why he cannot get rid of the foul and fetid smell that is clinging to his putrid carcass!Musa retired in September 2010 and as far as I am concerned, he is still a leopard who cannot change his spots. Musa is damned. Anyway, this scum did make a grave allegation. I think this may be Mahathir's doing – he is manipulating slopsuckers like Musa to attack Hishammuddin (directly) and Najib (indirectly) in order to position Muhyiddin and Mukhriz to take over in due course.The plot thickens.On Tuesday, I joined 27 other Toastmasters and guests at the Cobra-IJM Sports Complex in Petaling Jaya for the Taman Indrahana Toastmasters meeting.I was evaluating Jean Ng that evening – she was delivering an interesting speech titled “The City of Azaleas”. In fact this speech as well as the other three speeches were all good and the same could be said of the evaluations too.Overall the zeal and the zest were somewhat subdued – I would give this meeting a 7 out of a 10.